The Smithsonian American Art Museum revealed the winners of its public vote to decide what games will be featured in their exhibit, The Art of Video Games, today. The exhibit creates a visual history of the evolution of gaming from its humble beginnings through the present. The vote, which took place between February and April, helped to pick the majority of the exhibit, with only a few iconic selections guaranteed entry.

The games are split into five eras, each focusing on a generation of gaming. The Smithsonian was egalitarian in its selection, leaving very few consoles unrepresented. (Sorry, Jaguar!) Each game was selected to represent the gameplay and artistic style of its generation.

Their classification of games doesn't exactly match the classifications made by gamers. Fable and Shenmue are "adventure" games, Sim City represents strategy games, and so on. Both shumps and dungeon crawlers share the "Target" category, because they all revolve around players selecting a target and (generally) pressing a single button. Certain genres bounce around: Doom II is an action game, while Goldeneye is a "target" game. While these generalizations might seem abnormal to some, putting an emphasis on how much games have evolved in forty years shows many of these games in a different light.

Want to see if your all-time favorite game made the cut? Here's an alphabetical list of all the games featured in the exhibit.

1943: The Battle of Midway

Advanced Dungeons and Dragons

After Burner

Attack of the Mutant Camels

Bioshock

Boom Blox

Brütal Legend

ChuChu Rocket!

Combat®

Desert Commander

Diablo II

Donkey Kong™

DOOM II

Dune II: Battle for Arrakis

Earthworm Jim

Einhander

Fable

Fallout

Fallout 3

Final Fantasy Tactics

Final Fantasy VII

flOw

Flower

Geometry Wars: Retro Evolved 2

Goldeneye 007

Gradius V

Gunstar Heroes

Halo 2

Heavy Rain

Jumpman

Lord of the Rings: Battle for Middle Earth II

Marble Madness

Mass Effect 2

Metal Gear Solid

Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty

Metroid Prime 2: Echos

Minecraft

Myst

Okami

Pac-Man

Panzer Dragoon II: Zwei

Panzer Dragoon Orta

Panzer Dragoon Saga

Phantasy Star

Phantasy Star IV

Pikmin 2

Pitfall II: Lost Caverns

Pitfall!

Portal

Rez

Shadow of Colossus

Shenmue

Sid Meier's Pirates!

SimCity

SimCity 2000

Sonic Adventure

Space Invaders

Spy vs Spy

Star Fox™

Star Fox™: Assault

Star Strike

Star Trek: Strategic Operations Simulator

StarCraft

Super Mario 64

Super Marios Brothers

Super Mario Brothers 3

Super Mario Galaxy 2

Super Mario World

The Bard's Tale III: Thief of Fate

The Legend of Zelda

The Legend of Zelda: Link to the Past

The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time

The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Walker

The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess

The Secret of Monkey Island

Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell

Tomb Raider

TRON: Maze-Atron

Uncharted 2: Among Thieves

Utopia

World of Warcraft

Worms Armageddon

Zack & Wiki: Quest for Barbaros' Treasure

Zaxxon

Looking at the list, some of the games chosen are obvious shoo-ins: Mario 3, Metal Gear Solid, and Bioshock, to name a few. Others—Geometry Wars: Retro Evolved 2 and Metroid Prime 2—for instance, are more interesting. Certain series are very well represented: Zelda, Mario, Panzer Dragoon.

Tim Schaffer isn't a game series, per se, but he is very well represented here too.

Though the games of the exhibit have been unveiled, the installation is far from complete. The Smithsonian plans to open "The Art of Video Games" on March 16th, 2012, with the exhibit running from March through September.